USB HD and Linux

[dsr-mzpnVDyJpH4k7aNtvndDlA at public.gmane.org (Dan Ritter)]

On Fri, Aug 24, 2007 at 03:51:51AM -0400, Scott Ehrlich wrote:
> I recently purchased a USB HD device from Amazon.com (Hauppauge).   As I 
> looked around, some devices claimed to be linux-friendly (like the one I 
> got).

That's a little silly, because either a device complies with USB
Mass Storage Spec or it doesn't. Linux has an appropriate
generic driver for that.

> I then began to wonder what makes the device linux-friendly if its 
> sole function is as a tv tuner.   I know a device driver would need to 
> talk to it.   I then wondered if any usb tv tuner device might work? 

No. There's no universal standard for that driver, although
there is a Linux spec for the software API: Video For Linux, aka
V4L (and really, V4L2).

> Kind of line "Windows" and "Mac" friendly for some peripherals only if 
> they include software for those platforms, but if I have software that can 
> do the same, I can sometimes make something "Mac"-only work on a PC, and 
> vice-versa.

www.linux-usb.org is a good reference.

There are a few USB TV tuners that work:
http://www.isely.net/pvrusb2/pvrusb2.html
http://www.linuxtv.org/v4lwiki/index.php/Em2820
http://www.linuxtv.org/wiki/index.php/Supported_Hardware

-dsr-

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